Flagstaff Mayor Becky Daggett is going back to school. For a little while, anyway.
Daggett was one of eight mayors from around the United States selected to participate in the 2025 , a three-month program for mayors and their staff to learn more about planning, design and creative approaches to pressing issues.
The specific emphasis of the fellowship changes each year, and for 2025, participants are focusing on housing.
The program is a collaboration between the Mayors鈥� Institute on City Design (MICD) and the Just City Lab at Harvard鈥檚 Graduate School of Design. According to MICD, the program operates 鈥渕uch like a graduate school course,鈥� with a mix of in-person meetings, virtual lectures and discussions, and reading assignments.
Daggett doesn鈥檛 mind having homework to do.
鈥淭hat鈥檚 the beauty of being really excited about what you鈥檙e learning, is that it really doesn鈥檛 feel like any work at all,鈥� she said after completing the opening session on the Harvard campus and the first of the virtual meetings.
The program will include 鈥渄ynamic presentations and dialogues with experts in the fields of architecture, landscape architecture, urban planning, art activism, housing and public policy,鈥� MICD stated in a press release announcing the 2025 cohort of fellows. 鈥淭hroughout the fellowship, mayors and their staff will identify challenges in the social, economic and physical infrastructures of their cities and develop plans of action for their communities.鈥�
Daggett explained that the lectures and discussions allow for the blending of national-level perspective with the localized experiences of all the participating mayors.
鈥淚 feel so fortunate to be able to work through all of this material with these researchers and practitioners,鈥� she said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 practical knowledge, as well as research on these various topics.鈥�
The other participants in this year鈥檚 program are Kerry Thomson of Bloomington, Indiana; Harvey Ward of Gainesville, Florida; Scott Conger of Jackson, Tennessee; Shannon Glover of Portsmouth, Virginia; Steven Reed of Montgomery, Alabama; Helen Tran of San Bernardino, California; and Alma Hernandez of Suisun City, California.
The eight mayors have identified some common challenges in their initial discussions, Daggett said.
鈥淚 think that everyone is facing a shortage of housing. Every community has had similar issues with housing supply not keeping up with population growth,鈥� she explained. 鈥淭hen, every community is also dealing with limited tools to address true affordability.鈥�
The policy options in that metaphorical toolbox are different for each city. Some states, for example, allow inclusionary zoning through which cities can require developers to build affordable housing. That鈥檚 not an option in Arizona.
鈥淥ther communities have that tool available, and we probably have tools that they don鈥檛 have,鈥� Daggett said.
鈥淔lagstaff, I think, is pretty unique in that Flagstaff voters taxed themselves for $20 million to be spent on four different pockets of housing, including owner-occupied,鈥� she added. 鈥淚n all of my talking with people at HUD [U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development] and with other mayors, I haven鈥檛 found another community that has done that.鈥�
She was referring to Flagstaff鈥檚 Proposition 442, approved by around 60% of voters in the November 2022 general election. That proposition allowed the city to issue a $20 million general obligation bond backed by property taxes. The bond funding was intended to incentivize development of affordable rental units, redevelop city-owned low-income public housing for increased density and expand the city鈥檚 homebuyer assistance program.
The overarching question for all of the mayors in the fellowship, Daggett said, is 鈥淗ow do we scrape together funds to deal with housing along the continuum, from housing people who are currently unsheltered through homeownership?鈥�
She鈥檚 grateful that the city鈥檚 housing director, Sarah Darr, has also been able to participate in the sessions so far.
鈥淭hat鈥檚 one of the things that I think is so amazing about this program, is that staff can be there and be hearing the information at the same time, and we can be having conversations in real time about the readings and the lectures,鈥� Daggett said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 just a wonderful program.鈥�